The Black Swan Work Out

21.02.2011

KAK. Black Swan charts an unstable young ballerina’s crumbling sanity. Her body is the main terrain of her breakdown. Her legs snap back at impossible angles, her eyes redden, her fingernails bleed and her skin unpeels. She’s gaunt and wracked and clearly in all kinds of pain. What does Elle magazine get out of the body horror show? Workout tips!
“The million dollar question” they ask: “Why are ballerina’s figures so fabulously lean?” Lean! Try freakishly malnourished. Try gag-inducingly skinny. Try just plain unhealthy. Will the beauty myth ever release its fucking grip on women? Not if Elle has anything to do with it.

“It’s very extreme,” he says. “The diets are not healthy. There are a lot of food and calorie restrictions, lots of coffee and cigarettes to keep the weight down. The body is restricting calories, the pressure of competition is intense. All day she trained.”

Brace says Portman took no shortcuts. The actress herself has admitted she was “barely eating” to get into character. “I was barely eating, I was working 16 hours a day,” she told the Daily Mail.